Re: So ashamed and devastated

I understand your point of view Tommy, but you're telling me that from the time to where they got the statement to the time it was considered late, they didn't know what was going on? Yes, I have had banks freeze stuff on me, but never has it taken more than a week or so to get things cleared up. I'm sure this couple had more than a month to fix the problem and they instead chose to let their charge card become late. That's being irresponsible.

If my credit card is due on the 15th and I tell my wife to pay it by the 2nd of the month, you can bet your life I'm going to check to see if it's been paid. I'm not just going to sit around twiddling my thumbs because her bank is being weird. I'm going to pay my bill by the 15th. That's what responsible people do, they follow through with their payments, regardless of what their bank is doing. The minute the boyfriends bank froze the funds, they should have found another way to pay the bill. That's my opinion. I know that being irresponsible is given a pat on the back here at times, but I'm here to give people a reality check. You can't just put all your eggs in one basket like this and then cry when they all break.

Always have a backup plan or don't get yourself in these situations to begin with. If you yourself don't have $3000 dollars to cover a bill if your boyfriend can't, then you shouldn't be letting him charge on your card.

I also found this on this website:

"I believe that you have until 45 days after statement close before you pay any penalities or fees."

So she basically let 45 days elapse before she did anything. How is that being responsible? You're telling me it took 45 days for the credit union to clear a freeze? I find that highly unlikely and unbelievable. Here's what probably happened. They attempted to make payment at the last possible minute (maybe 10 days from late) and then they ran into this big problem. Irresponsible people are going to be irresponsible, no matter how much credit they build up. This is why banks have a hard time trusting people who make mistakes, because they will usually make them again.

Even if that is true it doesn't make them irresponsible.

If you make your payment 1 day before the due date you haven't been irresponsible.

Even saying that I am going to assume that this has more to do with personal issues than the OP. Why would you disbelieve the OP?

Do you naturally disbelieve anything you are told. This post doesn't scream troll/Amex hater/outrageous. If you are going to simply disbelieve the OP you could simply say I don't believe you to every thread posted here.

I've never known anybody have a bank frozen funds problem that took 45 days to square away. And if you don't have an extra 3000 dollars lying around, then you shouldn't be charging $3000 in goods and services. This is not a customer service issue. She was late with her payment and everyone knows AMEX hates that. I don't even have a card with them and I know they hate it.

I know that if I ever have an AMEX, not to ever be late and never to charge more than I can afford to pay off (including if there is a problem). And she didn't have to use a card to pay a card, but you can get cash advances from cards. There were a lot of ways to avoid being late, she just chose the "wait and see what happens" approach which is always the wrong choice. Also having an AU paying your bills is a poor choice as well. Ask anybody who has had a credit problem with an AU and they will tell you the same thing - unless the AU is Warren Buffett, never trust that they are going to square your bills away.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

Sorry, but something is not adding up here. Why didn't you and your boyfriend know there was a fraud freeze before the payment was considered late? How much time did you let elapse before you figured out there was a problem? You have some time between the time payment is due and time you are officially late, so what happened between the day you were billed and the day it was considered late enouth for Amex to FR you? It wasn't like this just happened in a 2 day period. There had to be weeks at minimum for you to figure out there was a problem. And if there was a problem, why didn't you take one of your other cards and pay off AMEX until it got squared away?

This is always a problem with authorized users in my opinion and why I would never trust my finances to a girlfriend or what not. Ultimately, you are the only person responsible for YOUR account. Yes we're supposed to trust the ones we love, but come on, this was totally avoidable. Learn from this going forward.

1. Never let another person be responsible for paying YOUR bills (even if they are somebody you love). I did THIS <<< once... needless to say, the car was repoed, even though I was just the co-signer. Our seperation agreement was that he would pay the bill. obviously that didn't work, and I got to pay for the deficiency balance, plus got a judgement against me back in 2007. Don't rely on others. If I had known what I know now, I would have INSISTED on selling the vehicle, or refinancing in his name only.

2. Always follow through to make sure the payment was posted in a timely manner. I can't count the number of times I hear people say, "I thought so and so made the payment, I was wrong." Regardless if it was a mistake, error or other. You should always be on top of it. Doing THIS << has saved my bacon more than a few times and I can honestly say that doing this, and paying at least 5 days before due assures that you are NEVER considered "late" by the creditor.

3. Let's say you get a bill and there's a 21 day period to make payment. If you entrust somebody to make payment by day 7 and it hasn't posted yet, then YOU pay it and deal with the person directly. Why would you ever just blindly trust and not actually check your acct to see if the funds cleared? Just sounds kind of ridiculous to me. Yes, I always check my balances on all accounts just to make sure there are no surprises and that everyone's gotten paid.

I'm sorry but this is partially your fault for making these mistakes. Learn from them and take him off as an AU on your other accounts. If there's not enough communication to know when stuff is supposed to go through and it's THAT HARD just to get a payment in, then maybe you don't deserve an AMEX. Just my opinion. Go ahead and flame away, but I think this whole situation was avoidable if you had just followed up on the payment before it was late.

I found this at this website. I don't have AMEX, but this person does:

"

There is a "please pay by" date on the statement that is like 15 days after the statement closes, but that is actually just a suggestion. Payment is not considered late unless it has not been received by the time the next statement closes."

So that means that a full statement period had to have passed for you to be late and you're telling me this whole time you didn't know what was going on and whoopsie, it just hit you like a big surprise? You never logged in to check your balance in that whole period? You never wondered, "Hmmm, why does it still show $3000 dollars due?" I'm not sure why everyone is patting you on the back for being irresponsible with your credit, but you're not going to get any sympathy here. Pay your bills on time if your boyfriend can't, bank error or not. And if you can't pay your bills when they are due, then you are better off not having a charge card and sticking to credit cards where you can make the minimum monthly payment. Amex made the right call in my opinion.

I hate to say it but I agree with HappySoda on some parts... I have added my comments in red above. Although I do think that the OP should call Amex and explain the situation. Live and Learn OP, and I hope everthing works out for you. Hopefully they don't put a 30 day late on your CR

Re: So ashamed and devastated

I understand your point of view Tommy, but you're telling me that from the time to where they got the statement to the time it was considered late, they didn't know what was going on? Yes, I have had banks freeze stuff on me, but never has it taken more than a week or so to get things cleared up. I'm sure this couple had more than a month to fix the problem and they instead chose to let their charge card become late. That's being irresponsible.

If my credit card is due on the 15th and I tell my wife to pay it by the 2nd of the month, you can bet your life I'm going to check to see if it's been paid. I'm not just going to sit around twiddling my thumbs because her bank is being weird. I'm going to pay my bill by the 15th. That's what responsible people do, they follow through with their payments, regardless of what their bank is doing. The minute the boyfriends bank froze the funds, they should have found another way to pay the bill. That's my opinion. I know that being irresponsible is given a pat on the back here at times, but I'm here to give people a reality check. You can't just put all your eggs in one basket like this and then cry when they all break.

Always have a backup plan or don't get yourself in these situations to begin with. If you yourself don't have $3000 dollars to cover a bill if your boyfriend can't, then you shouldn't be letting him charge on your card.

I also found this on this website:

"I believe that you have until 45 days after statement close before you pay any penalities or fees."

So she basically let 45 days elapse before she did anything. How is that being responsible? You're telling me it took 45 days for the credit union to clear a freeze? I find that highly unlikely and unbelievable. Here's what probably happened. They attempted to make payment at the last possible minute (maybe 10 days from late) and then they ran into this big problem. Irresponsible people are going to be irresponsible, no matter how much credit they build up. This is why banks have a hard time trusting people who make mistakes, because they will usually make them again.

Even if that is true it doesn't make them irresponsible.

If you make your payment 1 day before the due date you haven't been irresponsible.

Even saying that I am going to assume that this has more to do with personal issues than the OP. Why would you disbelieve the OP?

Do you naturally disbelieve anything you are told. This post doesn't scream troll/Amex hater/outrageous. If you are going to simply disbelieve the OP you could simply say I don't believe you to every thread posted here.

If your bank doesn't clear the payment by the due date then you are irresponsible. Yes, people who wait until the last minute are irresponsible. But in her case she didn't just wait until the due date, because as I've posted, the due date is just an AMEX recommendation. The issue went on long after her bill was due to turn this into a LATE which resulted in her credit card closure. This is not something that is AMEX's fault. They are very tough on new people being late and she should have known this going into it with them. I know this and I don't even have a card with them.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

I understand your point of view Tommy, but you're telling me that from the time to where they got the statement to the time it was considered late, they didn't know what was going on? Yes, I have had banks freeze stuff on me, but never has it taken more than a week or so to get things cleared up. I'm sure this couple had more than a month to fix the problem and they instead chose to let their charge card become late. That's being irresponsible.

If my credit card is due on the 15th and I tell my wife to pay it by the 2nd of the month, you can bet your life I'm going to check to see if it's been paid. I'm not just going to sit around twiddling my thumbs because her bank is being weird. I'm going to pay my bill by the 15th. That's what responsible people do, they follow through with their payments, regardless of what their bank is doing. The minute the boyfriends bank froze the funds, they should have found another way to pay the bill. That's my opinion. I know that being irresponsible is given a pat on the back here at times, but I'm here to give people a reality check. You can't just put all your eggs in one basket like this and then cry when they all break.

Always have a backup plan or don't get yourself in these situations to begin with. If you yourself don't have $3000 dollars to cover a bill if your boyfriend can't, then you shouldn't be letting him charge on your card.

I also found this on this website:

"I believe that you have until 45 days after statement close before you pay any penalities or fees."

So she basically let 45 days elapse before she did anything. How is that being responsible? You're telling me it took 45 days for the credit union to clear a freeze? I find that highly unlikely and unbelievable. Here's what probably happened. They attempted to make payment at the last possible minute (maybe 10 days from late) and then they ran into this big problem. Irresponsible people are going to be irresponsible, no matter how much credit they build up. This is why banks have a hard time trusting people who make mistakes, because they will usually make them again.

Even if that is true it doesn't make them irresponsible.

If you make your payment 1 day before the due date you haven't been irresponsible.

Even saying that I am going to assume that this has more to do with personal issues than the OP. Why would you disbelieve the OP?

Do you naturally disbelieve anything you are told. This post doesn't scream troll/Amex hater/outrageous. If you are going to simply disbelieve the OP you could simply say I don't believe you to every thread posted here.

If your bank doesn't clear the payment by the due date then you are irresponsible. Yes, people who wait until the last minute are irresponsible. But in her case she didn't just wait until the due date, because as I've posted, the due date is just an AMEX recommendation. The issue went on long after her bill was due to turn this into a LATE which resulted in her credit card closure. This is not something that is AMEX's fault. They are very tough on new people being late and she should have known this going into it with them. I know this and I don't even have a card with them.

So basically, the OP didn't check her account on the "Please pay by" date to make sure funds were cleared. If she had done this <<< then she could have avoided the whole being late thing by taking a cash advance on one of her other cards and paying it the bill online.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

What I find strange is that she let her boyfriend pushes payment to AMEX.

OP should have already have the funds available the moment she charged the ticket, rather than depending on her boyfriend. Especially pushing payment right before the due date, where she should have pay a week or two early.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

I know some people are afraid of the truth at times, but there are two sides to every story. There is the creditor side and there is the consumer side. I am not trying to make the OP feel bad, but she made a few mistakes and people should not be telling her that making credit mistakes are a good thing. Her mistakes are what got her into this hole and the only way to get out is not to make those same mistakes in the future. When you look past the matter-of-fact way I tell her things, you will see that I am giving her good advice.

1. Don't leave responsibility for bills in the hands of others (wife, husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, son, daughter, I have seen people from all walks of life ruin their family members credit)

2. Always check your statement before the due and/or late date to make sure it was cleared. If it hasn't cleared, make sure you follow up well before the actual late date hits for any potential problems.

3. If it hasn't cleared, beg borrow and steal to make sure you get your payment in before it reports as negative.

4. Never "trust" that anything is going to go through. You know it goes through when you see it post.

5. Give yourself wiggle room for any problems. If you are paying 3 days before the bill is officially considered "late" then you have no recourse if something goes wrong. Give yourself a week, preferably two before it's considered late. That way if anything goes wrong (boyfriend forgets, hurricane hits your bank, stock market crashes, bank run, economic disaster), you will have a good week or two to clear it all up and find an alternate way to not be late.

6. I highly recommend everybody has at least 2 bank accounts for just these kind of problems. Money in both. When you run into a problem with a bank, you can always turn to the other one as a backup. I personally have more than 2 but I am very paranoid about these things. You never know what can happen when a bank decides to freeze something or delay something. When Chase freezes you, you can simply say, "Okay, I'll go to my credit union to clear this up then worry about Chase later." Eggs in multiple baskets is the way to go.

7. Never charge more than you can afford to pay ON THE SPOT if things go wrong.

Re: So ashamed and devastated

I know some people are afraid of the truth at times, but there are two sides to every story. There is the creditor side and there is the consumer side. I am not trying to make the OP feel bad, but she made a few mistakes and people should not be telling her that making credit mistakes are a good thing. Her mistakes are what got her into this hole and the only way to get out is not to make those same mistakes in the future. When you look past the matter-of-fact way I tell her things, you will see that I am giving her good advice.

1. Don't leave responsibility for bills in the hands of others (wife, husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, son, daughter, I have seen people from all walks of life ruin their family members credit)

2. Always check your statement before the due and/or late date to make sure it was cleared. If it hasn't cleared, make sure you follow up well before the actual late date hits for any potential problems.

3. If it hasn't cleared, beg borrow and steal to make sure you get your payment in before it reports as negative.

4. Never "trust" that anything is going to go through. You know it goes through when you see it post.

5. Give yourself wiggle room for any problems. If you are paying 3 days before the bill is officially considered "late" then you have no recourse if something goes wrong. Give yourself a week, preferably two before it's considered late. That way if anything goes wrong (boyfriend forgets, hurricane hits your bank, stock market crashes, bank run, economic disaster), you will have a good week or two to clear it all up and find an alternate way to not be late.

6. I highly recommend everybody has at least 2 bank accounts for just these kind of problems. Money in both. When you run into a problem with a bank, you can always turn to the other one as a backup. I personally have more than 2 but I am very paranoid about these things. You never know what can happen when a bank decides to freeze something or delay something. When Chase freezes you, you can simply say, "Okay, I'll go to my credit union to clear this up then worry about Chase later." Eggs in multiple baskets is the way to go.

7. Never charge more than you can afford to pay ON THE SPOT if things go wrong.

This is good advice. Not trying to beat up the OP, obviously there were some things that were not expected that happened... by following the advice above, the OP can avoid being in a predicament where a payment is considered "late"

Re: So ashamed and devastated

Obviously people are thinkig that I missed the due by date and that's not the issue - as far as I was told. The issue is that the payment to AMEX did not clear because of the freeze on the account.

My cards are paid to zero, except for one which usually carries <10% of the CL. The others are paid in full before the due date. I've NEVER had a problem with this and had no reason to believe an account would freeze or a payment be considered fraudulent. I didn't think I needed to check because I didn't think there'd be an issue.

It was a mistake. One that I feel badly about. However, I doubt I should be considered to be irresponsible or undeserving of cards that, just one month before, I qualified and was approved for.

I'm working on it. Thanks for the votes of confidence in the resolution of this disaster.

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